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Should rounds be longer/shorter?

Earlier this week I posted a thread asking the board whether or not knees should be banned on the ground in WMMA fights. An article in this month's Fighter's Only got me thinking about changes to the rules that could take place as MMA continues to grow.

These rule changes might come about in the interests of improving/maintaining fighter safety, rectifying any ill-conceived rules that might favour one style over another, or to keep the sport from stagnation. Either way, I see it as inevitable that rules will be tweaked and changed over the next few years.

So... to go to the point. The article I mentioned above was about whether or not the length (and number) of rounds in MMA fights under the unified rules should be changed.

A number of old school fighters (Don Frye, K.Shamrock) - and some new-school fighters too like Gunnar Nelson - stated that they preferred the 10min/5min/5min set-up of Pride, or the no-time limit days of the early UFC's.

Others suggested having 3, 3-minute rounds, so that the 'feeling out' process would be bypassed, with fighters coming out aggressive to try and win each round.

So I'll say it again: What does the board think? Should rounds be shorter, or longer? Should there be more of them, or less? What about main events and title fights?

Personally, I'd like to see things stay the same for standard fights, but for main events (or maybe only 'official number one contender fights') and title fights I'd like to see a 10-minute opening round, followed by 4 rounds of 30-minutes. How many times have we seen awesome title fights that have ended just as the tides are turning (see Aldo/Hominick)?

I've been an advocate 5 THREE-minute rounds for a long time in routine fights, and 9 THREE-minute rounds in a championship fight.

painting this AM, will have to clean the filters on my ventilation.

rh

Last edited by rivethead; 03-29-2013 at 03:09 PM.

All manner of men came to work for the News: everything from wild young Turks who wanted to rip the world in half and start all over again -- to tired, beer-bellied old hacks who wanted nothing more than to live out their days in peace before a bunch of lunatics ripped the world in half.

I've been an advocate 5 five-minute rounds for a long time in routine fights, and 9 five-minute rounds in a championship fight.

rh

a 45 Min fight? I dont htink anyone right now has that kind of cardio.

and the other problem I see with this, is if a wrestler like Fitch, etc are in those fights they could get boring real quick. 45 min of being on top and doing nothing would drive me crazy. I understand that a fighter should be able to get up or have offence from the bottom, but some of those could get boring.

Intresting though,

"...for he today who sheds his blood with me shall be my brother." William Shakespeare

"Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it." Helen Keller

I think the current situation is more than adequate...I'm not sure I would be in favor of switching to the PRIDE format, despite how much I enjoyed it at the time.

No making the rounds shorter though, it would just take away from the ground game, and that's not okay in my books.

"To be truly walking on the warrior's path, we have to bring our minds back to the time when we were not ashamed of our dreams; when reality had not yet frustrated our ambitions; when our desire was still too strong to be repressed, and our spirit refused to surrender in resignation; when we were not yet doctors, businessmen, or lawyers, but still wanted to be heroes, leaders, bodhisattvas. The first step on the way to being warriors is to get back in touch with our dreams."

a 45 Min fight? I dont htink anyone right now has that kind of cardio.

Originally Posted by Badluck33

holy FUCK.

ugh. I fixed it.

rh

All manner of men came to work for the News: everything from wild young Turks who wanted to rip the world in half and start all over again -- to tired, beer-bellied old hacks who wanted nothing more than to live out their days in peace before a bunch of lunatics ripped the world in half.

I think jumping into round lengths is way too far ahead. It should start with basics that are ruining the current fight game. Things like intentional strikes to cause cuts to stop fights. Using the cage as an object to gain an advantage, I'd prefer a ring like pride anyday over a cage. How about a universal rule concerning actions on the ground to prevent literal lay and prey wins. And for the love of god and Joe Rogan, someone make some freakin new MMA gloves so people don't poke each others eyes out anymore. Some great fights have been stopped due to this BS and also some pretty severe injuries. I could say the same about someone making a universal improved cup but that's alot less likely to happen.

I'd rather see any of the above fixed before I think about round times of all things. Way too much stuff already wrong currently. 3 5 min rounds are fine. Give me some better trained judges too. Sick of seeing fighters robbed of wins like they stole somethin. Or when you see the cards and you clearly see one judge rule like he wasn't even watching the same fight as the other hundred thousand people. 3 5's are fine though. If you're gonna gas out you're gonna gas out period. 3 evenly timed rounds lets the cards work right for scoring better than different timed rounds would.

If it ain't broke don't fix it, ain't no one got time for dat! Fix the number of other issues first.

3 evenly timed rounds lets the cards work right for scoring better than different timed rounds would.

That's a really good point that I never really took into consideration. I could be wrong here, but I think that in Pride the judges, judged the fights as a whole and not per round. However, if the fights are being judged per round, a 10-5-5 makes it more complicated for the already terrible judges. This is a bummer, since I kind of like the idea of a longer round.

I don't think shorter rounds would result in more exciting fights, not at all actually. A guy like Anderson is going to feel out his opponent no matter how long the round. However I see a Fitch type of fighter being able to neutralize his opponent more easily and in such a short round the Ref would not really be able to stop it and stand them up. In a 10 minute round, the ref would be able to stand up fighters a couple of times and even penalize a fighter for taking the fight to the ground and stalling too many times.

I think the sport in its purest form would have no rounds, I think adding rounds or shrinking rounds takes away from that. A fighters strategy should be more geared towards the fight and not the rules, what I mean by that can be explained with an example from boxing. In boxing, time and time again you would see a fighter win the first 7 or 8 rounds and coast for the last 4 (great example of that is De La Hoya vs. Tito Trinidad) I would hate to see that happen in MMA.

If the judging could be fixed in parallel I would not mind seeing fights be 10-5 format and title fights in a 10-5-5-5 format.